Thursday, July 5, 2012

This morning I invited Bart Verveckken to share a drink with me at the Rhodes Memorial. We met at 09:30. He ordered hot chocolate and I ordered Earl Grey Tea.
As we were winding down our disussion and getting ready to leave, a whole party of people arrived, sat down and ordered, after which one of them stood up, and welcomed everyone of the party to this celebration of the 100th anniversary of the opening of the memorial on 5 July 1912. Turns out it was the Simon van der Stel foundation. Well-known Cape Town architect John Rennie then presented a highly informative talk about the history of the memorial and the inauguration.
It turns out that the memorial was opened exactly 100 years ago TODAY, by - wait for it - Albert Grey (1851 - 1917) - the Fourth Earl Grey, and grandson of the man after whom the tea was named.